Metal Detecting Finds Log
The awesome Grim Bleeper has featured our Metal Detecting log book on his channel and he loved it! Check out his metal detecting channel here.
Find more finds! Our Metal detecting log book has been designed to help you improve your understanding of how the metal detector reacts in different ground conditions. By logging what the detector tells you vs. what you actually found you can get a better understanding of the readings it tells you and know when to dig! Waste less time guessing and improve your accuracy.
Each metal detector is different and affected by:
- the ground conditions – how wet is it, minerals in the soil, how compact the ground is. Wet ground changes the conductivity of the metal detector signals so they can go deeper. However mineralized soil can give you false readings and make you think there is metal where there isn’t. Its important to understand how different sites react to your metal detector and log the differences. Over time you’ll develop a natural intuition.
- depth – how deep is the find buried. Its useful to log the depth that the item was at compared to what the detector reported, this information combined with the other logged details will help you understand how deep a target actually is and speed up the time it takes to recover items.
- size of find – larger objects are easier for the metal detector to find. A large object will pick up at greater depths and might fool you into thinking they are shallower objects of a different metal! As your skills improve you’ll be able to tell the size or shape of an object by listening to the metal detector tones.
- type of metal – different metals have different conductivity, this will show through the sounds the detector makes and the VDIs (Visual Display Indicator)
- orientation of the find – if a coin lies flat the detector can ‘see’ it better, if it is vertical it will be harder for the search coil to detect it
- interference – electro magnetic interference (EMI) can disrupt your signals or give you false readings. By putting this information into your metal detector log book you’ll remember which sites to avoid or what parts of a site suffer from EMI.
By logging what the detector reports and the information above you can really hone your understanding and speed up your detecting. You’ll dig less of the trash and more of the treasure.
The Metal detecting finds log also serves as a record of where you have been and what you found. Useful if you plan to go back because you didn’t finish an area, or if you want to avoid an area.
You can buy the logbook here.